478 
HAMHAMOU. 
here and there layers of white spar ; they are thinly covered with 
§tunted Acacias and brushwood, and rise so steep as completely 
to shut out all distant hills. The rising ground on which we are 
encamped, is at present only a heap of bare gravel and loose stones, 
covering a rocky base, out of the crevices of which shoot forth a 
few green bushes. Bruce passed a night on the same spot ; and it 
was his fortune, as well as ours, to encounter here a terrible storm, 
which, as usual, he describes with some exaggeration; although 
he was here on the 17th of November, a very different season. 
" From this place there is a winding path of a mile or more 
leading up the mountain on the eastern bank of the torrent, to some 
springs and natural cisterns in the rock, from which the tribes on 
the hills supply themselves with excellent water of a crystalline 
clearness. While we were at breakfast, a few miserable naked 
wretches, who live somewhere in the neighbourhood, came to us 
begging; we willingly made them partakers of our meal. 
" Before we recommenced our journey, Guebra Michael, our 
Abyssinian guide, came to us, and recommended, as provisions 
were beginning to fall short, to dismiss the Nayib's Ascari. 1 was 
not sorry for the opportunity, and therefore ordered them imme- 
diately to depart, with which, as they now found all their conse- 
quence was gone, they reluctantly complied, on receiving two 
dollars each as a bribe. 
" We quitted Hamhamou about ten A. M. the water having 
nearly subsided, and occupying only a small part of the bed of the 
torrent along which, as before, we took our way . As we advanced, 
the gully gradually became narrower, and our guides urged us to 
make all possible expedition, fearing that more water might come 
